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Democratic Senator Bob Menendez has just been indicted in one of the juiciest public corruption scandals in living memory, arguably even in the history of the United States. The New Jersey senator - who chairs the enormously powerful Senate Foreign Relations Committee - allegedly accepted bribes to perform various acts of public corruption which benefited not only his business associates, but also the government of Egypt. When the feds raided his home last year, they found hundreds of thousands of dollars in cash, luxury goods, and solid gold bars.
The case is a combination of the typical murky corruption of state politics - more on that in a minute - and some fairly mind-blowing stuff that affects key U.S. foreign relationships. Menendez allegedly tried to influence who would be appointed as New Jersey’s top federal prosecutor in order to benefit one of his chief fund-raisers, and separately to protect another associate’s monopoly over the supply of halal meat from Egypt. Far more seriously, he is alleged to have forged relationships - via intermediaries - with Egyptian officials, to have passed them secret information about U.S. policy towards Egypt, and to have worked to influence U.S. foreign policy in Cairo’s favor.
For the chair of the most powerful foreign relations committee in Congress to take bribes from a foreign government is unprecedented in American history. Menendez has already been forced to step down from the position of chair, but he’s vowed for now to stay on as U.S. senator from New Jersey. He’s under a lot of pressure from other Democrats to step down, because if he stays and fights for re-election in 2024 then he could easily lose what should be a winnable seat. He should obviously go, but he might not - he’s beaten the rap on corruption charges before and might think he can do it again.
But whatever happens to Menendez, there’s a deeper story here, one that will remain important into the future. And that’s how easily the U.S. system of government lends itself to corruption.
Federalism and fraud
The U.S. system of government is one with many different centers of power, and in which money flows freely. Federalism creates fifty state governments, each making decisions that allocate billions of dollars - if not tens or hundreds of billions - annually. Governors, state cabinet members, and state legislators all give input into how that money gets spent, and are all potentially valuable targets for anyone with an interest in corrupting the process. At the federal level, members of Congress can often influence the allocation of federal funding in their state and influence federal policy in favor of various groups and industries. Slushing around in the background are the cash flows on which American politics runs, often in the form of dark money, meaning cash which is spent on lobbying or influencing elections without it ever being known who spent it.
Throughout American history, state governments in particular have been centers of almost cartoonish corruption and abuses of power. The Gilded Age saw corruption on such a scale that it came to be seen as one of the the defining features of the age, whereas the Jim Crow era showed that the states could become a law unto themselves. Perhaps the epitome of a governor using the powers conferred by federalism to become a petty tyrant was Huey “The Kingfish” Long, who established a one-party dictatorship in Louisiana during the Great Depression. Long benefited liberally from corruption, turned the legislature into a rubber-stamp body, and had an opponent kidnapped and coerced into recording a message of support. Elected to the U.S. Senate in 1930, Long continued to hold an iron-like grip on Louisiana politics and its corrupt sources of revenue. It took an assassin’s bullet to put an end to Long’s reign, one year before he was widely expected to make a run for president in 1936.
In more recent decades, and particularly since the end of the Jim Crow era, such grandiose empire-building has been much less feasible. The Kingfish used corruption to fund the machinery of his dictatorship, whereas more recent figures seem to have aimed at nothing other than personal enrichment. One memorable example is Rod “Blago” Blagojevich, former governor of Illinois. When Barack Obama vacated his Illinois Senate seat after being elected president, Blago had the power as governor to name his successor. He proceeded to try to sell the seat to the highest bidder. "I've got this thing, and it's f*cking golden,” he said. “I'm just not giving it up for f*cking nothing.” The feds were listening, and Blago went to prison in 2011 - only to see Trump commute his sentence in some weird act of thuggish solidarity.
What makes the Menendez case so unusual is that it’s a combination of this sort of petty state politicking with corruption that cuts right to the heart of American national security. As chair of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, Menendez wielded an unusual level of influence over U.S. foreign policy. He also had a very direct say in a matter of great interest to the Egyptian government - arms transfers, which Washington had become more leery of ever since Abdel Fattah El-Sisi’s coup in 2013. Menendez’s was not only an important voice on the issue, but as chair he had to actually sign off on any transfers before they took place. If the allegations in the latest indictment are true, Cairo bought both his voice and his vote.
Like many other state politicos before him, Menendez seems to be someone whose longevity and consolidation of power within his home state made him feel invulnerable. Being a senator for nearly 20 years - as Menendez has - means knowing and trading favors with everybody, particularly in a relatively small state like New Jersey. It also means developing long-standing relationships with the sorts of federal officials who could do things for your constituents. But where Menendez has broken the mould is by corrupting not just his relationship with petty businessmen, but also his work as chair of one of the most powerful committees in the Senate.
The fish rots from the head
Even so, it’s not like Menendez is the lone corrupt official in an otherwise virtuous federal system. Just check out this overview of Donald Trump and Jared Kushner’s corruption:
In one near-constant reminder of Trump’s flouting of ethical requirements, he has maintained ownership of a downtown Washington, D.C., hotel that he rents from the government, effectively acting as both tenant and landlord. The hotel has become a hot spot for foreign dignitaries seeking to win favor with the new administration. And Trump uses the government to promote his properties, including his Mar-a-Lago resort where membership fees doubled to $200,000 one year after he won the presidency, giving members the chance to potentially influence the president for the cost of a membership.
Those in Trump’s orbit have also benefited from newfound power. Jared Kushner, Trump’s son-in-law and senior adviser, was able to obtain sizeable loans for his own debt-ridden real estate business after holding meetings with a private equity fund and a bank at the White House. In the case of that private equity fund, there was reportedly even discussion of its founder getting a position in the White House. Reports now indicate that the heavily indebted flagship Manhattan property owned by Kushner’s family will be rescued by an infusion of millions of dollars from a company linked to the government of Qatar.
Those paragraphs were written in 2018, years before Kushner received a $2bn investment from a Saudi sovereign wealth fund controlled by Mohammed bin Salman.
In a system where things like this are possible, it’s no surprise that some politicians lose sight of where the red lines are. Indeed, even completely legit aspects of American political lobbying and fundraising seem crazy by the standards of other countries. For instance, here’s a recent account of early steps by the Biden campaign to enlist donors:
Formal finance kickoff events like this are a rite of passage for presidential campaigns, and many of the people in the room have been through many election cycles. Donors were given documents explaining the terms of joining this year’s National Finance Committee, with minimum contributions of $46,000 to be a part of the group. That grants admission for the donor to one event with Biden and one with Harris, regular Zoom updates from campaign staff and a chance to attend quarterly meetings.
But deeper pockets receive bigger perks. The top tier of participation, the “Biden-Harris Presidential Partner” level, requires either $1.85 million in donations or $2.5 million in fundraising. These donors get tickets for four to special events with Biden and Harris in Washington next summer and another event at the convention in Chicago. They also get access to the “Millennium Park Package” at the convention, with VIP hotel rooms, top level convention credentials, box seats for the festivities, an invitation to a “podium preview,” and access to the convention center VIP hospitality suite.
To be clear, none of this is illegal, and campaigns have to do what they can to keep up in the cash-raising arms race. The 2020 election saw $14.4bn in political spending - double that of 2016, which itself broke records. But the problem remains a system in which politics revolves around the ability to raise large amounts of money, and for people who have that money to receive access to power and a chance to get their voices heard. Menendez’s case is particularly egregious because he made this trade with a foreign government, and he might go to prison for it. Meanwhile the system of easy and corrupt cash as a whole grinds on - and the American people as a whole are poorer as a result.